Embodiments of the invention relate to edge virtual bridging (EVB) environments, and in particular, reflective relay processing on logical ports for channelized links in EVB systems.
Edge Virtual Bridging (EVB) (IEEE 802.1Qbg) allows for two possible modes of operation for hypervisor host-internal switches: Virtual Ethernet Bridge (VEB) and Virtual Ethernet Port Aggregator (VEPA). VEB mode allows virtual machine (VM) network traffic to be switched internally to the hypervisor host whenever the network traffic is between VMs on the same host. VEPA mode allows the host-internal switch to acts as a port aggregator such that all VM traffic is first passed to the physical switch for processing. The physical network switches must support reflective relay (RR) in order to allow the VEPA mode of operation.
RR is configured on a switch that receives VM aggregated packets, such as VEPA packets, as some of these packets might be sent back to the server destined for another VM on the same server. RR returns those packets to the original device using the same downstream port that delivered the packets to the physical switch.